When death is deserving

The same 12 New Yorkers who quickly convicted terrorist Sayfullo Saipov last month of all 28 federal counts against him for murdering eight people on the Hudson River Park bike path on Halloween 2017 will now decide if he should be put to death or locked away forever. New York State doesn’t have capital punishment, but the U.S. government does in rare instances, like the terrorism committed by Saipov.

Other terrorists who murdered and maimed in pursuit of their twisted political ideology, either homegrown or foreign, have been sentenced to death by the federal courts. Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh’s death sentence was carried out and Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev’s death sentence is still being fought out in the courts. They used bombs. Saipov used a rented truck from Home Depot to run people down.

If the 12 jurors unanimously vote for death, expect years of legal wrangling over Saipov’s appointment with the needle at the Terre Haute, Ind. prison where federal death sentences are executed. Complicating the proceedings is sure to be Donald Trump’s impertinent interference into the legal process (of course). The day after the atrocity, the president at the time tweeted in all capital letters: SHOULD GET DEATH PENALTY!

Some may be opposed to the death penalty in all circumstances. We are not and neither are the 12 jurors, who had to so certify to the court. We think that its use must be reserved only for the most egregious offenses against society. If Osama Bin Laden was captured, tried and convicted, should he have died or been locked away as a living, breathing symbol to his followers? We would have voted for death in that case.

How about the 9/11 mastermind, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, a U.S. prisoner for 20 years, and long a guest in Gitmo? Should he ever be tried, death must be an option for the court.

McVeigh, Tsarnaev and Saipov are of the same strand as Bin Laden and KSM. They all sought death for others and so death may come for them.